After Surgery...

Two weeks after surgery, the fluid and blood accumulated under my arms and they caused my already flabby arm to look like...even flabbier arm. So Ms Aina had an MO aspirated the fluid out using a syringe. I healed speedily after that.

Then on the 11th of March I went to see my Onco, who was never around the first time I battled cancer in 2004. I brought her an update from Ms Aina because surprise, surprise... no Onco turned up for the combine meeting held a week prior. It was decided during the meeting that I was to have a C-sec at 30 weeks, and chemo about 2 weeks after that. After I voiced my concerned about the baby being borned at 3o weeks gestation to the onco...with the risks of lungs failure, infection, brain haemorrhage, apnea...she agreed to let the delivery be delayed to 32 weeks. "At patient preference" she told her MO to write in my file, in case I brought it against her in the future. And chemo was to start 4 weeks after that.

I was also told that this is not a recurrence, but a second primary, meaning a new cancer unrelated to the first one although they appear to share most characteristics: grade 3 tumor, triple negative...

I would have preferred to have chemo start earlier, probably 3 weeks after c-sec, because as always I'll recover fast. but the Onco couldn't know that could she? Because she wasn't always around...

A week may not seem much of a wait to anybody else but to a cancer patient...they are days worth counting.

I remembered when I went to Kinokuniya in KLCC with Aishah (HI CHAH!!) to look for Chicken Soup for the Breast Cancer Survivors' Soul, I came across an interesting book I so wanted to read but dare not buy. The title runs something like What Your Doctors Do Not Tell You. I flipped to the pages that concern me and it asks a very thought- provoking question...
"Why is it that a cancer patient survival is always evaluated at a five year time frame, not ten or twenty?"
The common believe is that if you pass the 5-year mark, you are considered "cured", which is stupid as cancer cannot be cured, unlike chicken pox!! I don't believe in that shit much because I've met people who relapsed after 7 and 10 years.
The book insists that chemo or whatever drug is available out there is only able to put you in remission for 5 years, if you are lucky. Most cancer patients die of cancer, sooner or later, depending on which is faster... the car speeding down the road or the cancer cells.

I personally do not care which comes first, as long as it doesn't come anytime soon. I don't mind dying, but I worry about my children. It's damn difficult not to believe in statistics with 11 lymph node positive for regional mets... and I keep hoping for a miracle...for me...

The Recovery

The recovery process was okay. I didn't believe in not eating certain things because they supposedly delay recovery, or eating a lot of certain other things because they speed it up. I just ate what I bloody well felt like eating. On the second day after surgery, I had a craving for 'kuey teow kerang' which my hubby not so regretfully substituted with 'kuey teow udang'. I ate that heartily. I also took eggs, even gladly accepted my next bed neighbour offer of her half-boil.

I remember when I was recuperating from my DIEP-flap at the plastic surgery ward in 2007, the help who delivered our breakfast whispered to me, good intentionally mind you..."I put these eggs here because they tell me too. Don't eat them if you want to heal quickly. They are not good if you just had an operation. They will leave puss and blood that'll look worse than a diabetic foot". Her eyes pitily wandered over the two tubes than came out of my right breast and the other two from my tummy. I bet she gave that advice to everyone in the ward because I sure could see two uneaten eggs on every tray, except mine.

The DIEP-flap surgery took approximately 12 hours and I was only woken up the next day. After I had the morphine taken off two days later, I noticed a man opposite my bed, his left foot wrapped and dangled from rods screwed to the bed. His wife came every day, feeding him, changing him. I learned that he was a policeman whose foot got run over by a lorry, wrecking the bones and nerves. He was there to try and get the foot fix , but by the look of him you would have thought he was the one with cancer, not me. He was so down and depressed he didn't talk to anyone, or make eye contact with anyone. The rest of us were happily calling McDonald's and Pizza Hut for delivery.

Unbeknown to me, the wife and the mother who came to visit him were watching me eat. So one day the wife approached me and asked why did I eat everything with little consideration for its effects on the wounds. So I said I did care...that's why I ate everything. I just had to recover quickly to go back to my daughter.

Then of course I had to explain about food pyramid, vitamins and minerals, like I was teaching Form 1 Physical Ed. I guess she told the hubby because the next day he sat up and began smiling to me, and ate everything. The patient before me who had free DIEP-flap was warded for 52 days. I was discharged after 10 days. That's the power of food...

But I digress...

This time round recovery was slower than 2004, but the scar that was left behind was less horrendous than the previous one. My left shoulder was tense for a couple of weeks but massages took care of that. There was more fluid to be drained this time and the drainage tubes were real pain in the ass. Being pregnant made it worse. I couldn't lie on my back because I got breathless and I couldn't lie on my left because of the darn tubes. So I had to be content with facing the sink on my right day in day out, and that resulted in even worse sore than the surgery itself.

Having cancer alone is hard enough on anybody, but to be pregnant at the same time...that requires super power to confront. But seriously, my daughter helps a lot. Although most of my energy is spent on her, she loves to hug me and give me kisses and would always want some parts of her body to be touching mine. That alone is enough to cure me of all the illnesses in the world.

The Inevitable....

When the news leaked to my friends, most looked at me with pity, which irritated me to the moon. God, how I hate that insincere sad look as they tried to look like they care when they really didn't. Some were really sympathetic, but for the wrong reasons. They might as well have balloons on top of their heads that say "Pity her not having any breast after this" or "The hubby will sure wander off soon". What they don't understand is, I didn't have any weird attachment to my breasts as they were never a source of self-esteem. I wasn't one to flaunt my cleavage, or wear tight fitting mini t-shirts to show off the C cups. In fact, when I first got them, they were an embarrassment, a nuisance I'd rather do without. For the first two years, I wore sweathers at midday, despite the 32 degrees Celcius.

Anyway, living with cancer inside you is like having a time bomb waiting to explode. Each day, a little of its toxicity leaks into your blood stream and when enough has circulated, either through the lympathic system or the vascular system, you turn into a mutant. Not nice ones like in Mutant X, but gory ones that everybody is eager to terminate.

So I quickly asked Ms Aina when could I get rid of this damnation and she looked relieved that I was so eger to do this. I imagined she came across enough patients who wanted delay so they could visit some shamans in some remote area of Kelantan who could miraculously transfer the cancerous cells to chickens or white breads. Or maybe that herbal tonic so widely advertised in tabloids would help, because they have pictures to prove.

Not yours truly though. So the surgery was scheduled a week after the 10th March, because I had to see the Gynae first to ensure that Qays, that's the baby I'm carrying now, was just as ready for the surgery, which he was. Then I had to go and see the Lung Specialist, to get a lung function test done because my asthma got pretty bad. She gladly diagnosed me with bronchial asthma and put me on the preventer and reliever. Next I had to see the Anesthetist who assessed the reports done by the lung specialist and gynea and decided on the proper GA.

I had never been so divided in my entire life. I was told that the GA could trigger an abortion. The Anesthetist couldn't make that clearer, and they made me sign forms for that. But the Gynea was confident that everything would go well, telling me that they see this all the time. I remembered thinking, as I was laid down on the operating table and all sorts of lines were connected to my hands and back, whether I should just bail out. As the Anesthetist injected the drugs that would put me to sleep into one of the lines, I screamed inside for everything to stop because the risk of losing the baby was suddenly too much to handle. The moment I was awakened from the GA, the first thing that I did was to grab my tummy to see if Qays was still there, and he was. Thank God!!

Unlike the first mastectomy in 2004, I didn't wake up puking green, bitter liquid. It was just like waking up from a deep sleep, and I could drink and eat soon after. But the recovery was worse, with soreness enveloping my entire left torso. But the thought of my daughter Qistina brought the best in me, and by the time dinner was served I could hold my left hand high above my head. Dr. Wilson chose just that momemnt to check on me and he was impressed, but probably concerned a bit because he quickly offered me painkillers, which I galantly refused. See, for this surgery, I didn't take painkillers at all. NOT ONE!

Later a nurse came and handed me a piece of paper and a pencil, for me to jot down the time each contraction occurs.
"What contractions?" I asked.
"Well, you baby of course", she calmly replied.
"Why? I don't feel any".
"Really? Because there were contractions during the op", she explained.
My heart almost stopped. I almost lost my baby. The next 48 hours was hell on earth. The pain was forgotten. I kept obsessing about the other life inside of me, about this piece of heaven that I carry inside my uterus. He was as strong as I was. We both survived the surgery.

Thank God.

These are pictures of the bath foam that they told me to rub my body with prio

r to surgery, the shaver to shave unwanted hair in the area concerned and the ceiling that I stared at on long lonely nights....

Why The Long Silence...

No, I wasn't busy. In December laziness just took over. Not common laziness. I just grew tired for no absolute reason, breathless after climbing up one flight of stairs, enjoying the sight of ceilings than horizons. So there I was, like a zombie until the mid of January...

Then the inevitable happened. I noticed two painful lumps at the lower outer quadrant of my left breast. After the failure with my daughter I was really looking foward to breastfeeding this time round, and I seriously thought the lumps were my breast getting ready for that because you know how your breasts go through confusing changes by the fourth/fifth month of pregnancy.

But by the end of the third week of January, the pain increased and so did the lumps, only they weren't round but sort of oblong. Well, not really. They just felt like swollen veins. The thought of cancer did cross my mind but the last time the lump was round and it wasn't painful, and the thought of having cancer while pregnant was just too horrific to consider...and there was this thing called hope...

Hope though gave me sleepless nights. And on the night of 29th January, I heard a voice in a dream insisting that I go for an ultrasound. Don't you think that is so Malaysian? That I only make a move after a dream? But really, that was my subconscious yanking me off my fat-laden butt and it worked. On the 3oth, I forced my way through an irritated clerk to get to the doctor, whom because of the long list of desperate patients, had to forego his Friday prayer.

Dr. Sulaiman told me the lumps looked suspicious, but they could be abcess. He scanned the axillar but that part was clear. I asked whether I need to hurry for a biopsy because my appointment was on 17th March, or should I just wait for the appointment date. He told me it's up to me. What kind of advice was that? I might as well ask my monkey. He was probably trying not to scare me off...and I hated doctors who gave hope when there was none...

What pushed me anyway was the fact that after many visits to the establishment for everything from mammogram to Pap Smear, this time he refused payment. The ultrasound and counsultation which cost RM120, were given free of charge.

Once home I called the hospital insisting on meeting my surgeon on 3rd March, which was granted once I explained what the ultrasound revealed. Ms. Aina was appalled that this happened because when I saw her in November, I was great. I went for an ultrasound guided biopsy and by this time, there were 3 lumps, one in the axillar. And a week later, they all turned up positive for Infiltrating Ductal Carcinoma...or in layman's term, breast cancer.

And I thought NOT AGAIN!!! NOT NOW!!!!

Life's Surprises...

I was about to fall asleep when it suddenly popped into my head that one of the not-so-bright friends of mine is getting a Phd.!!! Can you believe that? Throughout school she was always at the bottom 10, and even when she started working, I always picked up the errors, some major, that she made here and there but now...she's going to be a Dr.!!!

Last year an ex-student of mine, who was a head prefect but wasn't intellectually-inclined, came to school to get some signatures. I taught him in my first year of teaching, in 2001. I bumped into him at the office so I asked him what on earth was he doing at the school after 6 years, and he calmly said "I'm going to UK".

"Oh nice. For a holiday?" I asked.

"No...no. I'm pursuing a degree", he happily informed me.

There I was open-mouthed, because I remembered he hardly had any As in his SPM.

"I'm doing aeronautical engineering", he continued.

By this time I almost fainted.

"I remembered what you said about having big cars and great houses and hot chicks. I thought I'd make a go for it. The only thing is I only decided to really focus on my study after the junk I got for SPM".

I could only nod and left. I couldn't even congratulate him!! I remembered thinking...Is it safe to get on the planes say 5 years from now?

See, how a little something in the way could change the path of life? The doctor-to-be friend of mine is 32 and single. In this community, if you lack in the love department, you'd better make up in the career department. So if someone ask whether you really plan on remaining a spinster forever, you can at least say "But I have money and I am smart!" And that is what that friend of mine is doing.

As for the aeronautical engineer-to-be, being the head prefect with the lousiest SPM result in record history actually propelled him (pardon the pun) for a greater good.

For me who graduated top of the class, with countless As, about 3 Bs and no Cs in my testemonial, who scored a CGPA of 3.67 in my incomplete master's degree, who dreamed of a life of doing academic research and giving lectures to undergrads and postgrads, changed my life path too.

I chose a family life. And the event that triggered that change is, of course, the big C.

Once I thought a successful career would satisfy me, but after facing death in the face, and after the birth of my daughter, and after BRCA1, I chose love. Maybe I can have both, career and love, if I have, say, diabetes or some other controlled illnesses. but cancer with BRCA1 is an entirely different thing. It's like having an aneurism in your brain, except that before you die you'll get plenty of warning, thus the morphine but it's kind of the same too.

So life is a surprise...

Hairy Matters

The school holiday has begun. Actually, it began 2 weeks ago. On the last week of school, I noted some worrisome spotting on my panties and after a visit to the doctor, I was given pills to increase my hcg level, which in turn, gave me horrible, horrible pregnancy symptoms!! Well, you have to understand that my first pregnancy was relatively smooth sailing. I didn't have headaches or feel neousous and I could eat whatever I want and go wherever I wanted to. This second pregnancy was similarly easy too for the first two months. Then the pills change all that...

Anyway, baby is safe. I will begin the routine visit to the O&G next Tuesday.

Well, I'm thinking of getting a digital perm, whatever that means. I have a weird attachment to hair salons. I mean, I don't have a headfull of amazing looking hair. I used to, when I was younger. People complemented me on my hair over everything else before I completed puberty. But somewhere in my late teen, the volume just mysteriously disappeared and I was left with this limp looking hair that is not really straight, yet not curly either. It isn't even a good wave. It's just nothing and everything in between. So in my early twenties I had a full perm that made me look like ... to put it nicely, a poodle, or to put it not so nicely, like an ah so.

Then when the new millenium materialised and rebonding was in, I had my hair rebonded. It was okay then, because I weighted around 45-48kg back then. Then I got cancer, lost all my hair and the new one turned up very curly at the beginning, giving me nightmares on afro hair for months. Then it loosened up and I was left with a nice wave, which I stupidly straightened once influenced by a hairdresser who was probably on the verge of bankruptcy!!!

Everybody hated this hair, so I had it highlighted with brownish/blondish streaks. Now I'm thinking of digital perm. My students commented that I never have the same hairstyle for more than 6 months. As I admitted earlier, my hair is definitely NOT the most pleasing attribute of my persona but this obsession with hair salons should be stopped before I lost all my hair...and be bald again...and this time, maybe for good...

Wonderful Moments...

I’M PREGNANT!!!!! Well, the old folks would say not to get too excited as it’s still too early. So, I was keeping this mum, except of course I have to tell my husband so I could get off some the house chores like washing the dishes and doing the laundry. But in his over excitement, he happily told my father whom I had sternly warned last night to keep this to himself. Wonder if it’ll be on CNN tomorrow.

Anyway, I just came back from my husband’s hometown in Parit last Sunday, celebrating Raya. I had such a wonderful time I was reluctant to come back to reality. Across the road from his house is a place they call Padang on the bank of the long and winding Perak River which is exceptionally scenic and calming to the mind. Every time we go there, I swoon. Here in the city all I see when I look up would be high-rise condominiums and elevated highways with dust and smog doing waltz in the air 24/7…but over there…the clouds are like white puffs of cotton candy, creeping around the setting sun like slaves to the king…and the horizon…and the green, green grass where sheep graze freely…and oh the smell of pure air…

I took some photos with my camera phone but because it’s 3.2 megapix, they don’t do justice to the real McCoy. But still, here are some wonderful moments caught on well…memory card. Of course, I wasn’t on any of them being the one behind the lens, but my daughter is the one in red and black, lovingly held in the arms of the father. The others are nieces and nephews…
That's my miracle baby, in her most stylish poses with Maisara, a cousin, in a little town called Tronoh in Perak. The town looks a lot like a ghost town, with few cars in sight...none moving and a couple of elderly smoking cigarettes in front of shops that hardly sell anything. I mean, it looks like something that belongs to 1930s.